CHUCK LORRE PRODUCTIONS, #530

I'm thirteen years old, jammed in the backseat of a Chevy
Impala. My uncle is driving. My aunt is in the passenger seat.
My parents are in the back with me. The four adults are talking
about where they ate last night. This then leads to what they
ate, then to the quality of the food, then to queries about
other restaurants they may or may not have eaten in. I remember
thinking that when I grew up I would never be that boring, that
shallow.

Fifty years later. I'm driving my car. (I paid retail for it,
so I won't mention the manufacturer.) There are three other
adults in the car as well. The conversation is about food.
Where we ate, what we ate, how was it, and have we ever eaten at
such and such restaurant. As the discussion goes on around me,
I can't help thinking that I have betrayed my teenage oath.
I've become the banal grownup I once decried. Anxious to regain
my self-respect, I abruptly switch the topic to something more
consequential. I choose the threat of antibiotic-resistant
staph infections. My companions are startled. One asks what
that has to do with polenta. I can't figure out a way to
explain my long ago, silent vow so I angrily exclaim,
"Everything!"